Trial of the Sekhemas

The Trial of the Sekhemas is one of three Ascension Trials, first accessible in Act 2. It is a randomized gauntlet of rooms filled with monsters, traps, and bosses that can damage and reduce a player's Honour, ending the run when empty. Players are affected by Boons and Afflictions affecting the run's difficulty and can interact with a variety of mechanics to recover their honour, improve, or change their odds. The trial is based on the Forbidden Sanctum from Path of Exile 1.

Access

To gain access, the player must visit the Trial of the Sekhemas waypoint in Act 2 of the campaign and insert a Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: #
Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas.
I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. into the Relic Altar. Each trial run is independent between characters on the same account.

During the campaign, the player can acquire the Balbala's BaryaBalbala's BaryaArea Level: 22
Number of Trials: 1"Why are you standing there gawking at me?
We must go to the Trial of the Sekhemas!"Take this item to the Trial of the Sekhemas. Right-click to listen to Balbala. quest item by defeating Balbala, the Traitor in Traitor's Passage of Act 2. The item works similarly to a regular Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: #
Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas.
I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas., but it is returned to the player if the challenge is failed.

Every Trial of the Sekhema's run has a number of challenges spread across 4 floors with 8 rooms each for a total of 32 rooms. The item level of the Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: #
Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas.
I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. will dictate the number of floors available in the run and whether or not completing them will award the player additional ascendancy points. Higher level keys provide improved rewards and are tradeable.

	Floor 1	Floor 2	Floor 3	Floor 4
Trial Key	Balbala's BaryaBalbala's BaryaArea Level: 22 Number of Trials: 1"Why are you standing there gawking at me? We must go to the Trial of the Sekhemas!"Take this item to the Trial of the Sekhemas. Right-click to listen to Balbala. or Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: # Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas. I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. Area Level 20+	Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: # Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas. I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. Area Level 45+	Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: # Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas. I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. Area Level 60+	Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: # Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas. I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. Area Level 75+
Bosses	Rattlecage, the Earthbreaker	_{Hadi of the Flaming River and Rafiq of the Frozen Spring}	Ashar, the Sand Mother	Zarokh, the Temporal
Ascendancy Points	2	4	6	8

Mousing over the key will reveal both the area level and number of trials (floors) the run will yield. It will also indicate whether or not the run may grant additional ascendancy skill points upon completion. Consult the Ascension Trials page for more information.

Setup

Upon inserting the Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: #
Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas.
I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. in the Relic Altar, players will be able to place relics within, items that provide beneficial modifiers that affect your run. Once a trial has started, it must be completed, failed, or forfeited to add or remove relics. Relics can be also stored at the Relic Locker which is shared between all your characters in the same league.

Empty Relic Altar before putting in a coin
The Relic Altar in its initial state
Fully unlocked Relic Altar

The Relic Altar has 18 inventory spaces, 12 of which need to be unlocked by defeating floor bosses and opening key caches within the trial. The Djinn BaryaDjinn BaryaArea Level: #
Number of Trials: #"Take me to the Trial of the Sekhemas.
I will serve."Take this item to the Relic Altar at the Trial of the Sekhemas. will not be consumed until the relics are confirmed. Floor completion required to unlock squares is depicted below:

3	1	1	2	X
2				3
3				4
X	4	1	2	4

Unlocking the Ritual Altar for the first time will reward the player with a magic rarity Urn RelicUrn RelicPlace this item on the Relic Altar at the start of the Trial of the Sekhemas. These non-unique relics can have up to 2 modifiers and can be modified with a Orb of AugmentationOrb of AugmentationStack Size: 30Augments a Magic item with a new random modifierRight click this item then left click a magic item to apply it. Magic items can have up to two random modifiers.. The pool of modifiers relics can roll depends on the total number of inventory slots it takes up, ranging from 2/3/4 or small/medium/large respectively.

Navigation

All of your progress, including Honour, Sacred Water, Boons, Keys, and Afflictions are carried over between rooms and floors unless otherwise stated. If a player's client crashes during a trial, it will reset the room's progress as long as the player did not fail the room due to honour loss. However, any changes to the player's honour that happened in the room will be retained. Sacred Water and rewards are locked in upon successful completion of a room. It is possible to return back into a completed room from the reward room to kill any remaining enemies or open chests. Opening the door to the next floor in the reward room will prevent you from interacting with the merchant in that room any further.

Upon successfully completing a room, a door will lead to a safe area to collect the room's rewards. Players must select the next room by interacting with the trial map which will show a preview of room connections of the current floor. While by default, players are able to see 1 room ahead of their current position in the map, this number can be increased or reduced by boons and afflictions. Each room that is visible shows their their objective (name), reward (icon), and whether or not an affliction is inflicted on the player upon entry.

Room Objective Types

Each trial room contains one of the following objectives which must be completed to move forward:

Trial	Objective	Description
Chalice	Defeat the rare monsters	Activate the chalice and defeat all rare monsters in the room. Clearing 50% of the rare monsters will cause an indicator to appear, pointing toward those remaining.
Escape	Disable the crystals	Disable all the death crystals in the room before the timer expires. Activating crystals will lengthen the timer and indicate the direction of the next crystal.
Ritual	Defeat the ritual casters	Defeat ritual casters to close the portals spawning reinforcements.
Gauntlet	Find the exit	Navigate the trap circuit, activating coloured levers to unlock the path forward.
Hourglass	Survive	Survive continuously spawning monsters until the timer expires. Killing rare monsters reduces the timer.
Boss	Defeat the floor boss	Kill the floor guardian to advance.

Room Reward Types

Each trial room contains one of the following rewards:

Reward	Description
Merchant	Merchant rooms contain the NPC Balbala, the Released who sells you Boons or relics or restores your Honour in exchange for Sacred Water. Boons cost have individual prices, while relics cost 300, 400, or 500 Sacred Water based on their size. Balbala is also guaranteed to appear at the end of each floor in the reward cache room after defeating a floor boss.
Sacred Water Fountain	A fountain containing an amount of Sacred Water, a non-tradeable currency used within the trial.
Marakesh Shrine	Spend 5 Sacred Water to venerate a shrine and restore your Honour. Honour Tabina: Spend 5 Sacred Water to Restore 10% of your Honour. Honour Balbala: Spend 5 Sacred Water to Restore 10% of your Honour and gain a random Boon. Honour Ahkeli: Spend 5 Sacred Water to Restore 25% of your Honour and gain a random Minor Affliction. Honour Galai: Spend 5 Sacred Water to Restore 50% of your Honour before increases, gain a random Boon, and cleanse a random Affliction.
Pledge	Spend 5 Sacred Water to select one of three random Pledges.
Cache	A bonus cache of the specified type will be located in the room which can be opened by using any acquired keys.
Key	Awards the player with a Bronze KeyBronze KeyUsed to open Bronze Caches within the Trials, Silver KeySilver KeyUsed to open Silver Caches within the Trials, or Gold KeyGold KeyUsed to open Gold Caches within the Trials that can be used to open caches in cache rooms or the reward room after a floor boss. All types of Keys can be infrequently obtained from defeating monsters or opening chests and other loot containers in trial areas. Key drop rate can also be influenced by some non-unique relic modifiers. Keys can also be obtained by converting all remaining Sacred Water in the Keth Forge in the cache reward room after a floor boss.

Bosses

Boss Name	Boss Room	Floor name	Description
Rattlecage, the Earthbreaker	Collapsing Cavern	Test of Strength	Four-legged golem that uses fiery slam attacks.
Hadi of the Flaming River Rafiq of the Frozen Spring	Ceremonial Chamber	Test of Will	Two large melee sentinels that use fire and ice melee attacks.
Ashar, the Sand Mother	Sand Pit	Test of Cunning	A large scorpion that burrows and inflicts poison attacks.
Zarokh, the Temporal	Outside of Time	Test of Time	A floating chronomancer with several gimmicks related to action speed and time. Cannot pause the game against this boss.

Mechanics

Honour is an additional resource you have to manage within the Trial of the Sekhemas. A percentage of the damage you take from enemies in the Trial will be taken from your Honour. If your Honour reaches zero then the Trial is failed.

Maximum Honour Resistance is capped at 75% by default and cannot be higher than 90%.

Sacred Water

Sacred water is a type of non-tradeable currency used to trade with the Merchant to recover Honour, purchase Boons and relics, to venerate Marakesh Shrines to recover Honour, or it converted into Keys at the Keth Forge in the cache reward room after a floor boss. Fountains can be either regular or large. Sacred Water also can be found from chests or slain rare enemies and bosses. It appears as light blue droplets of water and is collected automatically when the player is near it.

Honour

Honour is a resource players have while participating in the Trial of the Sekhemas.

Honour pool:

A player's honour is based on the sum of the player's default maximum life and energy shield when starting the trial. If a character has the Mind over Matter keystone active, maximum mana will be added to this total as well.
Honour can be further increased or reduced by modifiers from relics, Boons, and Afflictions. It can be recovered by trading with the Merchant or venerating certain Marakesh Shrines.

Honour loss:

Players lose honour by suffering hits from monsters or traps in the Trial. Minions and non-party allies do not cause Honour to be lost if hit. Closer proximity to monsters reduces the Honour lost on hit, up to 35% less in close range.
Damage to honour is mitigated by Honour Resistance, an important stat players should invest into through relic modifiers that can reduce honour loss up to a maximum of 75%.
Honour is maintained between rooms, and the player automatically fails the trial when Honour is reduced to 0. Failing a trial does not count as a death, nor does it affect a character's experience.

Other interactions:

If a player levels up within the Trial, causing the player to gain additional life, an equivalent amount of Honour and maximum Honour will also be increased.^[1]
Gaining maximum honour through boons will also cause the character to gain current Honour of the same amount. Losing Maximum Honour will not further affect the current Honour.

Boons

Boons grant various benefits to your Trial run and can help recover or mitigate damage to your Honour, increase your Sacred Water and rewards, debuff monsters, and more:

Boon Type	Boon Name	Description	Merchant cost
Major Boon	Ahkeli's Guard	You cannot be Damaged for 1 second after taking Damage from an Enemy Hit
Major Boon	All-Seeing Eye	The Trial Map is fully revealed Note: This overrides the Black, Golden, and Red Smoke afflictions.	300-600
Major Boon	Crystal Shard	The next Affliction you gain is converted into a random Minor Boon
Major Boon	Dekhara's Necklace	You cannot receive any more Minor Afflictions
Major Boon	Earned Honour	Restore # of your Honour on room completion Note: This also restores all Life and Mana on room completion.	600
Major Boon	Garukhan's Favour	Ignore the first Damage taken from an Enemy Hit in each Room (note: this stacks between rooms)
Major Boon	Holy Water	Gain a random Minor Boon when you venerate a Maraketh Shrine
Major Boon	Imperial Seal	Traps are Disabled	600
Major Boon	Orbala's Leathers	Upon reaching 0 Honour, revive once with 50% less Honour
Major Boon	Raincaller	Sacred Water found is doubled
Major Boon	Reparations	Gain 2 Sacred Water when you take Damage from an Enemy Hit
Major Boon	Sekhema's Cloak	Upon reaching 0 Life, revive once with Full Honour
Minor Boon	Adrenaline Vial	Restore 30% of your Honour on entering a Boss Room	220-320
Minor Boon	Assassin's Blade	The next 10 non-Boss Monsters you Hit are killed instantly	220-420
Minor Boon	Balbala's Gift	Your next purchase from the Merchant has no cost	280-320
Minor Boon	Black Pearl	Traps deal 50% less damage	280 - 320
Minor Boon	Diverted River	Sacred Water found on this floor is doubled	220-360
Minor Boon	Enchanted Urn	30% increased Effect of your Non-Unique Relics	220
Minor Boon	Flooding Rivers	50% more Sacred Water found	220-420
Minor Boon	Fountain of Youth	Restore #(2.5%?) of your Honour when you venerate a Maraketh Shrine	280-420
Minor Boon	Fright Mask	Monsters deal 20% less damage	220-320
Minor Boon	Glowing Orb	The next time you go below 20% of Maximum Life, restore all Life, Energy Shield and 50% of Honour	160-420
Minor Boon	Hare Foot	40% increased Movement Speed	320
Minor Boon	Honoured Challenger	50% increased Honour restored	220-420
Minor Boon	Lustrous Lacquer	You have 50% more Defences	220-360
Minor Boon	Lustrous Pearl	Traps are slower	280-360
Minor Boon	Mirror of Fortune	The next Key you pick up is duplicated	360
Minor Boon	Moment's Peace	You cannot be Damaged until you complete the next room	220-320
Minor Boon	Orbala Statuette	You have 25% more Maximum Life	280-360
Minor Boon	Ornate Dagger	You and your minions deal 50% more Damage	220-360
Minor Boon	Sanguine Vial	Monsters have 30% less Maximum Life	220-420
Minor Boon	Silver Chalice	The next Minor Boon you gain is converted into a random Major Boon
Minor Boon	Silver Tongue	50% reduced Merchant prices	280-320
Minor Boon	Scrying Crystal	You can see an additional room ahead on the Trial Map	280-420
Minor Boon	Upward Path	Your Sacred Water found is increased by 10% on room completion (removed when you purchase something from the Merchant)	280
Minor Boon	Viscous Ichor	Monsters have 15% reduced Action Speed	220-360

Afflictions

Afflictions grant various downsides to your Trial run such as preventing or reducing Honour recovery, increasing the damage or speed of traps, buff monsters, reduce or disable your acquisition of Sacred Water, hide rooms or rewards on the Trial Map, and more:

Affliction Type	Affliction Name	Description
Major Affliction	Corrosive Concoction	You have no defences
Major Affliction	Deadly Snare	Traps deal Triple Damage
Major Affliction	Death Toll	Take # Physical Damage after completing 8 rooms (Note: this affliction is removed after it activates)
Major Affliction	Ghastly Scythe	Losing Honour ends the Trial (removed after 3 rooms)
Major Affliction	Glass Shard	The next Boon you gain is converted into a random Minor Affliction
Major Affliction	Orb of Negation	Non-Unique Relics have no Effect
Major Affliction	Unassuming Brick	You cannot gain any more Boons
Major Affliction	Unquenched Thirst	You cannot gain Sacred Water
Major Affliction	Veiled Sight	Rooms are unknown on the Trial Map
Minor Affliction	Black Smoke	You can see one fewer room ahead on the Trial Map
Minor Affliction	Blunt Sword	You and your Minions deal 40% less Damage
Minor Affliction	Branded Balbalakh	Cannot restore Honour
Minor Affliction	Chains of Binding	Monsters inflict Binding Chains on hit
Minor Affliction	Chiselled Stone	Monsters Petrify on Hit
Minor Affliction	Costly Aid	Gain a random Minor Affliction when you venerate a Maraketh Shrine
Minor Affliction	Dark Pit	Traps deal 100% increased Damage
Minor Affliction	Deceptive Mirror	You are not always taken to the room you select
Minor Affliction	Dishonoured Tattoo	100% increased Damage Taken while on Low Life
Minor Affliction	Fiendish Wings	Monsters' Action Speed cannot be slowed below base Monsters have 25% increased Attack, Cast, and Movement speed
Minor Affliction	Forgotten Traditions	50% reduced Effect of your Non-Unique Relics
Minor Affliction	Golden Smoke	Rewards are unknown on the Trial Map
Minor Affliction	Haemorrhage	You cannot restore Honour (removed after killing the next Boss)
Minor Affliction	Honed Claws	Monsters deal 30% more Damage
Minor Affliction	Hungry Fangs	Monsters remove 3% of your Life, Mana, and Energy Shield on Hit
Minor Affliction	Iron Manacles	You have no Evasion
Minor Affliction	Leaking Waterskin	Lose 20 Sacred Water when you take Damage from an Enemy Hit
Minor Affliction	Low Rivers	50% less Sacred Water found
Minor Affliction	Purple Smoke	Afflictions are unknown on the Trial Map
Minor Affliction	Rapid Quicksand	Traps are faster
Minor Affliction	Red Smoke	Room types are unknown on the Trial Map
Minor Affliction	Sharpened Arrowhead	You have no Armour
Minor Affliction	Shattered Shield	You have no Energy Shield
Minor Affliction	Spiked Exit	Take 25 Physical Damage upon Room Completion
Minor Affliction	Spiked Shell	Monsters have 50% increased Maximum Life
Minor Affliction	Suspected Sympathiser	50% reduced Honour restored
Minor Affliction	Tattered Blindfold	90% reduced Light Radius Minimap is hidden
Minor Affliction	Trade Tariff	50% increased Merchant prices
Minor Affliction	Tradition's Demand	The Merchant only offers one choice
Minor Affliction	Untouchable	You are Cursed with Enfeeble
Minor Affliction	Weakened Flesh	25% less Maximum Honour
Minor Affliction	Winter Drought	Lose all Sacred Water on floor completion
Minor Affliction	Worn Sandals	30% less Movement Speed if you've been Hit by an Enemy Recently

Pledges

Players may sometimes be able to take on a Pledge to Kochai the Inscrutable at a Shrine, allowing the player to pick one of three random Pledges which provide significant upsides and downsides:

Icon	Upside	Downside
	Gain a specific Minor Boon	Lose 25% Maximum Honour
	Gain a random Major Boon	Lose 50% Maximum Honour
	Gain 2 random Minor Boons	Lose 50% Maximum Honour
	Gain a specific Minor Boon	Gain a specific Minor Affliction
	Lose a specific Minor Boon	Lose a specific Minor Affliction
	Gain a specific Minor Boon	Gain a random Minor Affliction
	Lose a specific Minor Affliction	Gain a random Minor Affliction
	Gain a random Minor Boon	Gain a random Minor Affliction
	Lose a random Minor Affliction	Lose a random Minor Boon
	Gain 3 random Minor Boons	Gain a specific Major Affliction
	Lose 3 random Minor Afflictions	Gain a random Major Affliction
	Gain a random Major Boon	Lose 3 random Minor Boons

Traps

Spike Trap: Several large spikes will shoot out of the ground periodically, indicated by rumbling and dust.
Flamethrower Trap: A four-way flamethrower spins around in a circle. Some ruined walls may provide paths to avoid them. Inflicts a fire damage over time effect on health and honour.
Poison gas pressure plate: A pressure plate that releases poison gas when the player steps on it. Deals high chaos damage if stood on.
Poison gas pressure plate that activates a colored lock: Similar to the above, except these will be connected to a colored lock and release gas after a short delay.
Poison dart pressure plate: A pressure plate that causes poison darts to be fired.
Fixed fireball turret: Slow-moving fireballs are shot out of the wall in a sequential pattern, with a short reload.
Rotating fireball turret: Slow-moving fireballs are shot out sequentially while the turret rotates, with a short reload.
Fire mine: Indicated by an orange circle on the ground. When stepped on it activates after a very quick delay, dealing high fire damage.
Quicksand: Standing on it builds the quicksand debuff, slowing the player's action and movement speed. Deals no damage.
Time mine: Standing on it inflicts the temporal rift debuff, teleporting the player back to the mine's location, then exploding after a short delay. Sometimes next to other traps.
Fixed portal turret: Fires slow moving projectiles through portal in a straight line. Inflicts shock.

Note: Most traps can be dodge-rolled through, with immunity for the entire animation.

Boss Reward Room

The boss reward room can be accessed after defeating any of the floor bosses. Other than containing a stash, the Ascension Shrine, and the Keth Shrine to convert leftover Sacred Water to keys, this room contains Balbala as a Merchant and a trove of caches.

The quality of caches spawned can vary between regular, superior, and prime, seemingly increasing the rarity of items within. Small and medium caches also refer to the quantity of items contained. Type of caches include:

Gear Caches: Helmets, Body Armour, Gloves, Boots, Shields, Jewellery, Amulet, Rings, and Belts.
Relic Caches: Small and Medium Relics
Reward Type Caches:
- Arcanist's Cache: Contains basic currency
- Hoarder's Cache: Contains random stacks of gold
- Mysterious Cache: Contains a random selection of gold and items including relics and keys
- Cartographer's Cache: Contains waystones
Archetype Caches:
- Warrior's: Melee weapons
- Mage's: Caster weapons and Foci
- Ranger's: Bows and Crossbows
Jewel Caches:
- Royal: Sapphires, Emeralds, and Rubies
- Time-lost: Contains time-lost jewels
- Gold Spectrum Cache: Contains a random Grand Spectrum unique jewel

Party play interactions

Party play within the trials are governed by the following set of rules:

The Trial of the Sekhema's choices are made by the area's instance owner.
All party members share Honour.
If a party member joins midway through the trial, their relics apply to calculate their maximum honour, and then the flat amount of honour damage lost by the instance owner is applied to them. This can lead to instant death for the joining party member if, for example, the instance owner has 6000/7000 honour, and the newly joining party member has 1000 max honour.

Version history

Version	Changes
0.3.0	Failing to collect all the hourglasses during the Zarokh, the Temporal boss fight no longer fails your Trial of the Sekhemas, now instead only damaging your Honour. If you fail to collect the hourglasses, Zarokh, the Temporal now enters a secondary phase where the hourglasses and slow debuff persists but at a much slower rate. You are now able to respawn at checkpoint from the Escape Menu in the Trial of the Sekhemas and Trials of Chaos, which will take you back to the entrance of the respective Trial.
0.2.1	The Affliction in Trial of the Sekhemas that caused you to have no Energy Shield now instead applies 50% less Energy Shield, so that it isn't immediately dead on arrival when you are Chaos Inoculation.
0.2.0g	Regular Bronze chests now have the same base balance as Rare chests do in the Normal Difficulty campaign, including guaranteeing a Rare Item. Silver and Gold chests increase Item Rarity and Item Quantity by values significantly higher than before. Arcanist's Chests have had the same improvements to drop composition as Researcher's Strongboxes. Arcanist's Chests (Currency) and Royal Chests (Jewels) are much more common. The chance of getting SilverSilver KeyUsed to open Silver Caches within the Trials and Gold keysGold KeyUsed to open Gold Caches within the Trials as room rewards instead of Bronze keysBronze KeyUsed to open Bronze Caches within the Trials has been significantly increased.
0.2.0	The Worn Sandals Trial of the Sekhemas Affliction now grants 30% less Movement Speed if you've been Hit by an Enemy Recently (previously 25% reduced Movement Speed).
0.1.1e	Added a Quick-Travel button to the Waypoint Map for Trial of Sekhemas.
0.1.1	Added keyword for Honour Resistance.
0.1.0e	(Hotfix 5) You can no longer use the instance manager to create multiple instances of the Trial of the Sekhemas. Honour Damage now scales down based on distance to enemies, you now take up to 35% less Honour Damage when in close range, tapering as you are further away from Monsters. Fixed a bug where Damage over Time was dealing three-times as much damage to Honour as intended in the Trial of the Sekhemas, and fixed a bug where Honour Resistance was only applying to two-thirds of that damage taken. (This got confusing for us too). Skitter Golems no longer use basic attacks and instead now just explode as their attacks were largely unavoidable when in Melee Range. Serpent Clan burrow and ambush attacks now have improved visual telegraphing and cannot be used from as far away. Volcanoes created by Rattlecage's Fissure Slam now last half the duration. Added keyword hover for the Honour mechanic in the Trial of the Sekhamas.
0.1.0	Introduced to the game.

References

↑ https://youtu.be/I68bBRA8aa8?si=Aupuun4wCnB8HhFa&t=598

[1] ttps://youtu.be/I68bBRA8aa8?si=Aupuun4wCnB8HhFa&t=598

[1]